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The Online Marketing PeopleThu, 26 Feb 2015 17:36:23 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4.2FocusON: PPC Tips – Granularity Is The Key!http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/ppc-tips-granularity-is-the-key/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=ppc-tips-granularity-is-the-key
http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/ppc-tips-granularity-is-the-key/#commentsThu, 30 May 2013 14:07:04 +0000Andy Darnellhttp://www.pushon.co.uk/?p=12924PPC is one of the founding cornerstones of Google, and all online search for that matter, so one of the key things you can do as an advertiser is get your paid ads working as hard for you as possible! As such one of the key things you can do to ring out as much... Continue reading

]]>PPC is one of the founding cornerstones of Google, and all online search for that matter, so one of the key things you can do as an advertiser is get your paid ads working as hard for you as possible! As such one of the key things you can do to ring out as much efficiency from your PPC activity as possible is to ensure you employ a structure of maximum granularity.

The overarching principle of PPC is a simple one – match your products / services, which are represented through your keywords, to the people searching for them by matching the users search query to your keywords…then show them a targeted ad reflecting their search.

So by organising your ad groups into a granular structure the more reflective of the users search you can be with your ad copy. Below is an example based on a search term of “mens cheap brown brogues”…

The idea here is that you develop key tightly controlled ad groups which will have strong CTR’s and accompanying conversion rates too as they will be picking up search queries further down the search funnel and therefore due to the much greater degree of relevance should have a much higher propensity to convert.

This method will also allow you the ability to deep link specific ad group sets of keywords directly to the most appropriate page of the site…and as we know the further down the sales process we can deliver your customers then, again, the higher the likelihood of conversion.

This leads us on the next benefit of this approach which is that over time as you use your search query reports you will be able to move traffic away from arriving at your ad through a broad matched head term into exact matched long tail. As has been seen time and time again we all know that the long tail exact match terms are where we expects to see the strongest CTR’s, conversion rates and ROI’s all accompanied by lower CPC’s.

Another incidental benefit is that if clear, logical naming conventions are used in setting up all campaigns and ad groups it can make reporting on specific areas of the account much easier too.

Warning! While the additional layers of granularity can have a really positive impact on the PPC performance, it does need to be implemented carefully and well controlled. The granular nature of the account means that it would need to be tightly controlled through the use of negative match types so that whenever a long tail search term is typed in by a user then it is forced through the exact match ad group to capitalise on the lower CPC’s that can be available.

This is a relatively simple process of, whenever a new long tail exact match keyword is added to the account, that it is also added as a negative against the broad match head terms in the campaign.

It can also mean it is slower in gathering ad group levels data to lower number of clicks hitting the highly targeted one as opposed to much broader ad groups that will gain clicks much quicker…but sure the potential end result of improved efficiencies and lower costs is worth it?

]]>http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/ppc-tips-granularity-is-the-key/feed/0FocusON: Are You Making The Most Out Of Your Google Grants Account?http://www.pushon.co.uk/news/are-you-making-the-most-out-of-your-google-grants-account/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=are-you-making-the-most-out-of-your-google-grants-account
http://www.pushon.co.uk/news/are-you-making-the-most-out-of-your-google-grants-account/#commentsThu, 09 May 2013 10:16:03 +0000Nikki Stasyszynhttp://www.pushon.co.uk/?p=12738The Google Grants programme has just celebrated its 10th birthday. Launched in April 2003, this scheme has evolved over the years and Google works with registered charities, providing them with grants to spend in Adwords. However, the number of charities that are actively using this suggests that the majority of UK charities are either overlooking the... Continue reading

The Google Grants programme has just celebrated its 10th birthday. Launched in April 2003, this scheme has evolved over the years and Google works with registered charities, providing them with grants to spend in Adwords. However, the number of charities that are actively using this suggests that the majority of UK charities are either overlooking the benefits of this, or are simply not aware of the scheme’s existence. This additional resource of up to $10,000 per month can make a huge difference to a charity’s marketing budgets and so although it can take several months for a grant application to be approved by Google, if you have not yet applied, it is definitely worth doing so here.

This grant does come with a number of restrictions, such as that the ads must only run on Google UK, links in the ads must only be to the pre-approved domain, the ads must be text only and not commercial, there must be no adverts on your own site such as Adsense and each bid must cost no more than $2.

The last criterion is a reasonably new update as Google increased this limit from $1 per click at the end of January. However, this increase in bids came with the announcement that all Grant funded adverts would now be featured underneath any self-funded company or charity adverts. So while this change may open your organisation up to being able to target keywords that were previously outside of this bid limit, sites are likely to have seen a decrease in traffic due to featuring lower down the listings.

However, with the changes that were announced to Adwords just a couple of weeks after this, PPC account managers have been given the opportunity to better manage these adverts. By upgrading to enhanced campaigns, you are now able to manage all devices in one campaign, manually adjust the bid for mobile ads and show call extensions on these mobile ads. This shift from legacy to enhanced campaigns is going to be enforced automatically by the end of June for any accounts that have not made the change themselves. Google have since released a tool that allows you to change campaigns in an account in bulk.

Beyond that, Grant accounts should largely be run in the same way as normal Adwords campaigns. These accounts should be maintained (if you do not work on your account over a 3 month period then Google will stop your funding), the accounts should be well structured and you will need to optimise the account to ensure that you are getting the most out of your spend. Ensure that the keywords that you target are relevant to your organisation and the pages that you are sending visitors to are also relevant and contain a call to action in order to get the best return from your spend.

If you are running a Google Grant account, we would love to know what impact have you noticed since these changes were implemented.

In conjunction with the launch of FocusON for PPC month, we are giving away a Google Chromebook to one lucky reader. Simply visit the PushON Prizes app over at the PushON Facebook page and follow the three simple steps to be in with a chance of winning. HINT: You may want to read FocusON: An Introduction to PPC Marketing first!

]]>Greetings fellow earthlings and welcome to our latest summary of SEO-related things we spotted this week.

Raven Blog – Forecasting Traffic by Keyword Rank:

Do you ever feel buried under a mountain of metrics? Are you grabbing data here, there and everywhere in an attempt to wow clients that, most likely, do not appreciate the value of a beautiful looking bounce rate pie chart? And who can blame them?
The gumption-filled SEO team at Raven have come up with a useful approach to compiling reports which cuts out all but the ‘actionable analytics’ needed to expediently and efficiently run an online marketing campaign. Focusing on these three metrics: traffic, ranking and conversions – is sticking right to the point of a worthwhile SEO campaign. This is especially useful, or indeed, absolutely necessary for serving clients with smaller budgets or other time constraints.

And speaking of pie charts…..

Raven have done it again with an interesting post on how to rustle up an accessible backlink data chart. Charts and diagrams are created to enable the client (and us) to visualise certain sets of data. Without them we would have to resort to lengthy, continuous prose on the poor state of some client or others backlink profile. Raven’s backlink explorer tool allows you to classify backlinks by anchor text type (for example) which you can fashion into a useful and legible pie chart for use in the quest to prove the value, if not necessity, of SEO to your customer.

Google’s rolling out changes to PPC quality score:

The new Google AdWords algorithm goes global this week which means quality scoring will change to factor landing page quality. Giving more weight to ads with landing pages most relevant to the search query will enhance the user’s experience as well as enabling PPC enjoyers to rank better for lower cost-per-click bids.

Google launches “trusted stores” program:

Google’s new consumer championing scheme has launched this week and goes by the name of Google Trusted Stores.

Designed as an aid to online shoppers; reliable ecommerce sites with a history of timely shipping and good customer service will be furnished with a Trusted Stores badge for their site. Not only does this scheme highlight the trustworthiness of certain honoured vendors - it offers protection against errors in billing, unfair or non-existent returns policy and slow shipping.

Daily Mail publishes pre-written “guilty” story for Amanda Knox:

A massive gaff from the Daily Mail who were all too keen to be the first getting news of Amanda Knox’s guilty verdict out there – they published:

“Amanda Knox looked stunned this evening after she dramatically lost her prison appeal against her murder conviction…”

Over-efficiency has not paid off this time for the newspaper as Knox was found not guilty of murder (on appeal) but guilty of slander. No doubt as soon as the reporter heard the judge say ‘guilty’ – he or she hit the publish button.

Linkstant – get notified when your site gets a new backlink:

Brought to us by Tom Critchlow and Rob Ousbey – the Linkstant code, when placed on your site – will notify you as soon as your sites get any new backlinks. The advantage to using this code is the immediacy of getting live backlink information. This could have many useful applications from motivating your team of link builders – or in running a reputation management project, as another aid in keeping an eye on reviews or other mentions (provided the critic has put a link to your site in there). Indexing and crawling can take months, analytics can take several days. However, Linkstant is (probably almost) instant.

]]>http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/seo-weekly-round-up10/feed/2Roger Boyes: Riding the Trendhttp://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/roger-boyes-riding-the-trend/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=roger-boyes-riding-the-trend
http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/roger-boyes-riding-the-trend/#commentsFri, 26 Mar 2010 13:05:35 +0000Simon Whartonhttp://blog.pushon.co.uk/?p=1653Much hillarity across t’internet due to the byline on the Times Article “Vienna Boys’ Choir Caught up in Sex Abuse Scandal” by Roger Boyes. Well, this has gone across the social media space like wildfire and has been trending on Twitter. It occured to my cynical mind that this might just possibly be a linkbait... Continue reading

]]>Much hillarity across t’internet due to the byline on the Times Article “Vienna Boys’ Choir Caught up in Sex Abuse Scandal” by Roger Boyes. Well, this has gone across the social media space like wildfire and has been trending on Twitter. It occured to my cynical mind that this might just possibly be a linkbait scam by the Times prior to it instigating the paywall. So I thought I’d just check to see if Mr Boyes was real via the almighty Google. You’ll notice from the screenshot of the SERP below the

at there is a Wikipedia article about the journalist so clearly, if Wikipedia says he exists, he must do.

SERPs for Roger Boyes

But hang on, look to the right at the PPC ads. Oh dear. Ebay has “Feed your passion on Ebay.co.uk”, Play has “Roger Boyes books £9.99″ and my personal favourite “Roger Boyes at Amazon”

I guess there’s a serious point here as well that you’d better make sure that if you’re punting at terms you dont clearly understand by an automated process, you got some big risk

]]>http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/roger-boyes-riding-the-trend/feed/2Common PPC Misconceptionshttp://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/common-ppc-misconceptions/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=common-ppc-misconceptions
http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/common-ppc-misconceptions/#commentsWed, 12 Aug 2009 16:17:33 +0000Mark Maynehttp://blog.pushon.co.uk/?p=1230On a day when everyone seems to be writing about Caffeine (Google’s new search index) I thought I would bring you a few home truths about PPC. I personally really enjoy using and testing the various different PPC platforms and as an advertising medium think it offers some great benefits. The return on investment in... Continue reading

I personally really enjoy using and testing the various different PPC platforms and as an advertising medium think it offers some great benefits. The return on investment in comparison to other advertising platforms looks favourably on PPC and its easy to use once you get the hang of it. One of the big problems (especially with newcomers) is that people fall foul to common PPC misconceptions. Today I am going to highlight some of these misconceptions.Always Avoid The Content Network – In many respects PPC is all about testing. Testing the options available to you gives you a much bigger insight in to what works and what doesn’t. Too often people avoid using content networks because they have a misguided belief that it’s a waste of time. In fact content networks can be extremely powerful and offer higher returns on investment than traditional search ads. It is practically always on a market basis but I have found it useful in sectors such as the insulation industry. Content networks have also come on leaps and bounds in the last few years with more targeted options being made available. Give it a try and see what you find.

Number 1 position = Number 1 Results – In fact this is entirely untrue. Various research studies have shown that ads displaying in positions two to five can offer much higher conversion rates. You will pay less for these positions which makes it an interesting proposition. Test the different positions to see which achieve the best return for you.

It’s All About The Google – Google’s dominance in both search and PPC means that users are usually drawn to using their PPC system. However both Yahoo and Microsoft offer their own PPC networks and cater to different audiences. Certain types of users will chose to use Microsoft’s search engine for example. Are the people who use this, your target audience? If so, you will want to advertise on there. Other networks are usually much cheaper as you have fewer advertisers to compete against.

Click Fraud Will Bleed Me Dry – Many newcomers or people who are thinking of entering the PPC arena are put off by potential click fraud. The fact is that Google and other networks have become extremely clever at detecting these and users don’t have to pay for fraudulent clicks.

These are some of the ones I come across regularly but in fact there are many more. If you are considering doing a PPC campaign take the time to do your research first or consult PPC professionals like ourselves : )

]]>http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/common-ppc-misconceptions/feed/1Google AdWords New Interface Usabilityhttp://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/google-adwords-new-interface-usability/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=google-adwords-new-interface-usability
http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/google-adwords-new-interface-usability/#commentsWed, 20 May 2009 14:23:39 +0000Katrina Gallagherhttp://blog.pushon.co.uk/?p=963I love the new features, and it’s a great improvement on the old interface, but there’s one schoolboy usability error that I’ve just noticed: Can you guess what I’m on about?

]]>http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/google-adwords-new-interface-usability/feed/0Pay Per Click Marketing Management Examshttp://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/pay-per-click-marketing-management-exams/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=pay-per-click-marketing-management-exams
http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/pay-per-click-marketing-management-exams/#commentsFri, 28 Nov 2008 20:46:36 +0000Katrina Gallagherhttp://blog.pushon.co.uk/?p=673Fantastic day for the PushON team… OK, so it was a long and boring day, but the great news is that Mark qualified as a Google AdWords Professional, and I’ve qualified as a Microsoft adExcellence Member.

*How do you work out how much you can afford for each click

Your break-even cost per click is :

Conversion Rate x Profit

E.g. Conversion rate of 14% and a profit per sale of £15
You have a maximum of £2.10 per click to spend to break even.

If you don’t actually sell online, you can still attach a rough figure to this.
Work out how much each lead you gain from your website is worth and use that to determine how much you should be spending on your pay-per-click.

If you know that you can convert 10% of your website leads for an average transaction profit of £500, you can work out your break-even point as follows:

Break-even point = website conversion rate x 10% x £500

For a keyword that achieves a visitor-to-lead conversion rate of 2%, and you have an average profit of £500 per transaction, your break-even point will be:
2% x 10% x £500 = £1 per click

i.e. you will be in profit if you have an overall average cost per click less than £1.

But make sure you take the cost of your time (or agency management time) into account.

]]>http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/funny-pay-per-click-advert/feed/0Google AdWords PPC – Embedded matchhttp://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/google-adwords-ppc-embedded-match/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=google-adwords-ppc-embedded-match
http://www.pushon.co.uk/blog/pay-per-click-ppc/google-adwords-ppc-embedded-match/#commentsTue, 19 Aug 2008 17:06:42 +0000Katrina Gallagherhttp://blog.pushon.co.uk/?p=311What’s this all about then? Well, as I was contemplating what match types to delete, add and test together in Google AdWords, I came upon a match type that I’ve not exploited enough. Embedded match gives you the opportunity to display your advert for a broader range and every variation of a keyword, except for... Continue reading

Well, as I was contemplating what match types to delete, add and test together in Google AdWords, I came upon a match type that I’ve not exploited enough.

Embedded match gives you the opportunity to display your advert for a broader range and every variation of a keyword, except for the keyword itself.

Embedded match in action

If you are promoting roof insulation for example, you could use the negative embedded match -[insulation]. So that you will show adverts for keywords such as “roof insulation”, “loft insulation”, etc.

So you’re showing for long tail keyword phrases relevant to your key product of insulation, but you benefit from a lower level of competition, lower cost per click, higher variation of keywords and an end user that is further down the purchase process.

It’s also a good tool to use at the start of a campaign for discovering new good and bad keywords that you can ban using negative match or add these keyphrases in their own right as phrase or exact match.

How to use embedded match

So as not to give away all my secrets, we’ll use the term ‘hamster’.

Add the negative exact keyword -[hamster]

Add the broad match keyword “hamster”

In this way, you will appear for ‘hamster accessories’, ‘hamster food’, ‘hamster wheels’, and ‘how to stuff a hamster’, but crucially not the vague and potentially unprofitable term ‘hamster’.